The study conducted by a Social Security Disability Insurance company found that Maine is the most dangerous state to work in, while New York registered as the safest state.

For the study, researchers examined work accidents and injury data provided by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics. In order to determine which states put workers at the greatest risk of serious injury, researchers examined how many accidents were so severe they caused the employee to switch jobs or experience major changes in their responsibilities. You can see the results below:

The Most Dangerous States For Workers

  1. Maine (1.4 severe injuries or illnesses per 100 workers)
  2. Indiana (1.1)
  3. California (1.0)
  4. Nevada, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas, Wisconsin, Alabama, Connecticut, (0.9)

The Least-Dangerous States For Workers

  1. New York (0.1)
  2. Hawaii (0.2)
  3. Louisiana (0.3)
  4. Alaska, Wyoming, West Virginia, Delaware, Massachusetts (0.4)

Researchers couldn’t pinpoint the reason why some states were more dangerous than others. Some argued that Maine employs more manual laborers than New York, but a look at the data reveals that both states same the same percentage of white collar jobs (38%).

When researchers attempted to find correlations across between profession and location, they came across some confounding results. For example, serious injuries in the car and truck manufacturing ranged from an average of 1.1 cases in Tennessee to 3.5 cases per 100 workers in North Carolina. Similarly, nurses were nearly five times as likely to suffer a serious injury or illness in Maine than the national average.

Researchers ultimately concluded the differences could be credited to taxonomy and environment. Taxonomy is the way in which a state classifies an injury, and some environmental landscapes lend themselves to injury more so than others. Would you rather drive the Smokey Mountains in Tennessee, or the flat cornfields of Iowa?

The Most Dangerous Jobs

The insurance company Allsup also examined data to determine which industries were the most dangerous. The nationwide results may surprise you.

  1. Amusement parks/arcades (3.2)
    2. Animal slaughtering/processing (3.1)
    3. Beverage manufacturing (2.7)
    4. Metal casting foundries (2.7)
    5. Nursing care facilities (2.6)

Related source: Time